Tobio Kageyama
is a first year at Karasuno High School; he is the regular setter of the Karasuno High Volleyball Club and plays a critical role as the second protagonist of the Haikyuu!! series by Haruichi Furudate. Initially, he was referred to as "King of the Court," a derogatory nickname that insinuates his autocratic nature, given to him by his former teammates at Kitagawa Daiichi during his late middle school days. Kageyama is also widely regarded as a stunning prodigy and an absolute genius by many of the prefecture's players and coaches. After joining Karasuno, he manages to change his attitude for the better with the help of his new teammates and rediscover what it means to be a part of a team. Appearance Kageyama's height and impressively sharp glare are said to be his most prominent physical characteristics. He often emits a rather intimidating aura, which is heightened by the almost permanent scowl he has on his face. His hair is black and cropped short, with a fringe that hangs just above his dark blue eyes. His typical attire consists of either his school uniform or practice clothes. He resembles a fresh young blueberry. Personality Perpetually sullen and undeniably short-tempered, Kageyama originally came off as a typical overbearing perfectionist, caring about nothing else but winning and completely disregarding the opinions and well-being of his teammates. His habit of complaining about their performance and barking orders at them eventually led the other players in the club to nickname him "King of the Court" – a constant reminder of the oppressive, egocentric attitude he demonstrated during his volleyball career in middle school. Unbeknownst to the majority of his schoolmates and acquaintances, however, he is actually much more sensitive and childish than he appears to be; he simply does not know how to control his frustration and express his thoughts and emotions in an appropriate way. After everyone in Kitagawa Daiichi became fed up with him and abandoned his side, Kageyama was filled with genuine regret and developed an intense fear of being despised and mistrusted, but refused to openly discuss his problem until Tsukishima confronted him about it. Despite his inability to properly socialize, he sincerely wishes to do his best and is extremely passionate and dedicated when it comes to volleyball, to the point where he gets overly excited about nearly every successful move he pulls off with Hinata. Since joining Karasuno, he has grown to be more respectful of his upperclassmen (Sugawara and Asahi in particular), as well as more accepting of people whose abilities and/or views differ from his own (Like Tsukishima), and has come to once again understand the importance of teamwork and mutual trust in the sport he treasures so much. Additionally, this has also helped him regain his confidence as a setter. He has also realized he doesn't call the shots, and gives up control to Hinata and fellow spikers. Statistics According to Coach Ukai, as a setter, Kageyama has the potential to unify the team with his overwhelming talent, but hasn't learned how to exploit that to everyone's full advantage yet. He has a remarkable grasp of both the basics and the complexities of volleyball and, in addition to his astounding accuracy and technical skills as a setter, is a skilled spiker, blocker and receiver. His "best" set is the so-called "King's Toss," which causes the ball to go straight with a lot of force past through the spiker's point of impact. Originally, his teammates found this sort of set to be impossibly fast to spike. Following Karasuno's summer training camp, Kageyama learned to perform a set that falls around the spiker's point of impact. The brutal force he'd habitually put into it would thus die out and allow the spiker to manipulate the ball in whatever way they wished. Kageyama also has an affinity for improvised strategy, and was the first person to suggest using Hinata's enticing presence on the court for the sake of turning the smaller boy into an effective decoy. 'Pinpoint Accuracy:' Kageyama's most prominent and praised skill is his ability to completely accurately determine a ball's trajectory before he sets it. Combined with the fact that he can set any ball from any angle at incredible speeds, this makes his sets almost impossible for most of his oponents to predict and/or counter. Kageyama can use his accuracy and fast handling of the ball for other purposes too, such as straight shots and setter dumps. By observing Hinata's instinctive reactions and calculating the height of his jump, Kageyama can figure out exactly where and when his partner will swing his hand in order to spike, and send the ball straight to him at the perfect moment in time; this enables the duo to perform their infamous "Freak-Quick" sets. 'Quick Sets:' The "God-Fast Spike", also known as the "Freak-Quick" and the "Oddball Combo", is an offensive maneuver developed by Kageyama and Hinata during their three-on-three match against Tsukishima, Yamaguchi and Daichi. It combines Kageyama's setting talents together with Hinata's speed, agility and extraordinary jumping power. Kageyama uses his pinpoint accuracy in order to set the ball into the best possible position for Hinata to execute a spike. Kageyama's sets are so accurate that Hinata does not even need to look at the ball in order to hit it -- he relies on Kageyama's calculations entirely, believing that he will succeed in getting the ball to him regardless of the circumstances. Indeed, the sole reason why this technique has worked out the majority of times Kageyama and Hinata have attempted it is because of the latter's uncanny trust in the former. The Evolution of his Quick Sets: After inspiration from former Coach Ukai, current coach Ikkei Ukai talks to Kageyama and sets that seem to "stop" on point and fall where the spiker hits in order for the spiker to hit the volleyball with their own will and control the direction, force and various other factors of the ball. Starting from the summer training camp, Kageyama starts practicing these sets on his own without Hinata, using plastic bottles put on the floor as his ultimate target. At first, he could not get any sets to the correct place unless having a bit of luck. Coach Ukai then told him to visualise Hinata spiking, and how that would help him with his pinpoint sets that using spin to fall on point. Quickly after that, he got a shot right on his target, and is then determined to do more. Trivia *Favorite Food: Pork curry with an egg on top. *Current Concern: He gets the feeling that animals dislike him even though he likes them. *Kageyama usually buys a carton of milk during lunch. *His seiyuu, Ishikawa Kaito, is also the seiyuu for Nine, a character in the anime Zankyou no Terror. Number nine is Kageyama's uniform number. *His star sign is Capricorn. *Before choosing Karasuno, Kageyama tried to get into Shiratorizawa, but he had failed the entrance exam. *After failing the entrance test to Shiratorizawa Academy (the powerhouse school), Kageyama chose to attend Karasuno because he wanted to train under the old Coach Ukai, though the former actually collapsed shortly before Kageyama joined. *In Haikyū!!: One Shot, Kageyama's reason for joining Karasuno was actually because he wanted to fight "Top Schools". Hinata and Kageyama had also formed their "Freak-Quick" during a match against another school instead of during the 3v3 match. *Kageyama is the youngest member of the team. *He claims to have poor memory when it comes to English vocabulary but when he was quizzed by Daichi on tactic signals, he was able to answer them quickly and revealed that it took him barely a day to memorize those. This shows that he does have great memory, but lacks motivation to put it to use on subjects that aren't Volleyball. *'Nomenclature': **Tobio (飛雄) - Flying Hero **Kageyama (影山) - Shadow Mountain References Category:Characters Category:Male Characters Category:Karasuno High Volleyball Club Category:Setters